


Not Near Enough

by Deannie



Series: Writ in Remembrance [3]
Category: The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Gen, Mag7daybook Summer Stockings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-31
Updated: 2014-07-31
Packaged: 2018-02-09 20:41:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1997094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deannie/pseuds/Deannie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Don’t matter what Buck’d say. He ain’t here. Finally quit myself of him and about damn time. Drinking helps me forget that, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Near Enough

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BMP](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BMP/gifts).



> This is a stocking stuffer for nonobaddog over at mag7daybook. She wanted pre-series Chris. Be careful what you ask for!

“Hey, mister. You, ah… you wanted another whiskey?”

I look up from the latest empty bottle and see the bartender. Mouse of a man. No idea what the hell he’s doing in a rough bar like this. With bad men like me.

“Leave the bottle,” I say, glaring at him to go away.

He does. Hell, they all do, which is the God damned point. I don’t need any of them. Days like this I wonder why I bother living on to another sunrise. Be damn easy to just _miss_ one of these times when some idiot pisses me off enough to step outside and draw down.

Whiskey don’t quite hit the glass at first, but enough of it gets in to drink a little more of it all away. Adam’s laugh is in my head again, Sarah’s eyes….

Buck’d tell me that same old crap about living ‘cause she’d’ve wanted me to. Don’t matter what Sarah wanted, does it? Sarah wanted a lot of things. She wanted me for some God forsaken reason….

She wanted a house—I found her land and built her a house. She wanted an “ordinary life”—I took up the horses. She wanted a family—we had Adam and another one on the…

God DAMN, I don’t have enough whiskey!

Don’t matter what Buck’d say, either. He ain’t here. Finally quit myself of him and about damn time. Drinking helps me forget that, too.

 

“God damn, Chris, just look what you’re doing to yourself!” Buck’d been fired up, all right. Was the anniversary of their deaths and I had almost enough whiskey that time. He took exception—plus, I figured he was still pissed about the young turk I’d killed in the last town. Boy was asking for it, and I can’t exactly say no anymore. Not if I want to live.

Not sure I want to, at that, but they keep on coming and I keep on not missing, don’t I?

“Sarah’d roll in her grave at this, Chris and you know it.”

That was when I’d finally done what I’d been threatening and drew on him. Even drunk, I’m a dead shot. “She has to, doesn’t she, Buck?! She’s dead because we had to stay that one more night in Mexico— _you_ had to!”

Buck had a look in his eye…. Can’t even describe what it was.

“You gonna shoot me now, Chris? That it? Finally had enough?”

 

Enough what, I wonder?

Ain’t enough whiskey tonight, that’s for damn sure.

Anyway, like I said, it don’t matter what he would say now. I don’t need him or nobody. I just need more whiskey.

Part of me sort of wishes he was here, though. I ain’t sorry for that night—he had no right to tell me what Sarah would have said—but I… got used to him being there.

Don’t need him following me around, though. Don’t need him as a reminder of all that’s gone. Glad to be rid of him.

“Hey, Big Dog.”

Tall. Mustache.

“Buck?”

Smile. That smile—all carefree and troubles-gone, even though I know he’s been through Hell and back.

“Looks like you got quite the collection of fallen soldiers there, Chris.” My glass is moving away from me. “Maybe we should find you a place to lay down for a while. Sleep ‘em off.”

“Ain’t had enough whiskey yet, Buck.” I sound like Adam wheedling out of bedtime. “Ain’t had near enough.”

The smile goes sad and I know he’s hearing Adam, too. Hell, after all these years, I reckon I know all of him, don’t I?

“There ain’t enough in the world, Chris,” he says quietly. “Best just curl up and wait ‘til morning.”

I reckon he’s right. Usually is.

_“Sarah’d roll in her grave at this, Chris and you know it.”_

Why’d he come back?

“Come on, Larabee,” he says, taking my arm and pulling me to my feet. I notice something blearily.

“What’s with your arm? You get hurt or something?”

He gives me the strangest look—something I can’t read, even though, like I said, I know all of him, don’t I?

“Yeah, Chris.” Sounds resigned. Like I feel. Resigned to live another day. “Yeah. Nothing for you to fret about, though. Let’s just get you somewhere before you get too far gone again.”

I nod. Probably for the best….

What’s he mean “again”?

 

I don’t remember how I got to whatever hotel room I’m in, but it’s spinning as bad as they all do when I’ve had almost enough whiskey. God damn, the headaches are worse than the need to turn my stomach inside out! There’s an empty chamber pot beside the bed and I use it for just that. Feel a little better with my stomach lining on the outside.

It takes a minute to focus on the chair across the way, but the familiar saddlebag sitting there answers the question of whose room I’m in, at least.

I wonder why Buck came back. Wonder why he left, too—I wish I remembered the night he disappeared on me—the anniversary of my life going to shit—but it’s lost in a haze of rotgut. Most of them are, thank God.

But I wish I remembered that one. He’s all I have left, now. Can’t afford to lose him, too. Part of me wonders whether I said something I shouldn’t have. I know he didn’t know what was happening when we spent that last night in Mexico. Just keep telling myself it’s not his fault….

I’d kill for some whiskey.

A light knock on the door has my head coming up and I groan at the pain.

“Now don’t shoot me, Larabee,” Buck’s grinning voice comes through the wood, “or I won’t give you what I got hidden up my sleeve.”

He opens the door awkwardly, balancing two mugs of coffee, and I notice his left arm’s in a sling. Probably some irate husband. Love’s going to be the death of him someday.

“That something better damn well be whiskey,” I growl. “Else I might shoot you in the other arm.”

He freezes strangely for a second, and I wonder what I said to put that look on his face. It’s gone quick enough that I could almost think I dreamed it.

Must be the damn hangover.

“You must’ve just rolled into town yesterday,” he says, handing me a half full cup of coffee and pulling a bottle of rotgut out of his sling. “Saloon’s still standing.”

“Got here Tuesday,” I say, pouring whiskey in the cup to top it up, sloshing it over the side as my hands shake. “Ain’t found nobody to piss me off yet.”

He grins. “Well, I reckon that’s progress, then, ain’t it?”

“Come on, Buck,” I grate, headache building as I see what’s coming. “We gotta go over this again?”

“No.”

Simple and clean. Confusing.

“No?”

He shrugs. “Chris, I’m done trying to lecture. Done trying to change your mind.” He grabs the whiskey from me and takes a sip from the bottle. Ain’t like him to drink this early in the day. “I just come to make sure you’re okay. I’m heading back south, toward home. Ain’t gonna burden you with more talk.”

Part of me’s damn happy. All I want to do when he starts in trying to convince me it’s going to be okay is dive into a bottle—maybe shoot him first. So I’m happy, but…

“I could do with a bit farther south,” I say, knowing that if we left from here, we’d be sure not to pass too close to Eagle Bend. Knowing he’ll come with me if I ask. “Little town called Purgatorio.”

Buck stares at me a long moment and shrugs, smiling that smile that hides a pain enough like mine to burn. “Can’t be worse than Hell, right?”

I smile big. Hell’ll follow us, no matter what. Might as well take my anger out on those that deserve it.

“No. No, I reckon it can’t.”

******

The End


End file.
